Prison Reform Movement

The United States Criminal Justice System is flawed- broken beyond repair. Prisons should be abolished. Treatment and social safety nets could effectively replace what we have in place now. Until society can finally come to terms with no prisons and jails, we will continue to advocate for Prison and Criminal Justice reforms.

Posts here are NOT always my work. See disclaimer in the 'about' section. This blog serves as a Public Service Announcement.

Take Action Monday’s for Davonate Sanford

Standing for the Innocent has launched a new campaign to support Davontae Sanford. Take Action Monday’s asks that we call & email the DetroitDistrict Attorney’s office and question why Sanford is still in prison.

The campaign started last week and will continue until July 30th.

Each and every Monday until July 30th-Make a call on behalf of Davontae Sanford to Kym Worthy the district attorney who prosecuted him.Kym Worthy, DAphone: 313 224-5777

email: prosecutor@co.wayne.mi.usleave a msg if you cannot speak to her or an assistant. Question- why they insist on keeping an innocent young man behind bars for a crime they KNOW he did not commit.

some facts:

1. A nation that prides itself as having the best justice system in the
world should tolerate no room for corruption, lies and misconduct that
sends an innocent child to prison for a crime he did not commit. Not
even for a day, much less 37-90 years in prison.
2. Nearly five years ago, on September 17, 2007, Davontae Sanford, a
fourteen year old mentally disabled boy who could only read on a second
grade level, and blind in one eye, left his home in his pajamas shortly
after 1 a.m. to investigate police activity at a home on Runyon Street
not far from his home. Curiously, as most children would do, Davontae
walked up to the scene and asked one of the officers what was going on.
One of the officers told him, “You know what’s going on,” and took him
into custody.
3. Davontae has suffered a
tremendous injustice- After hours of
interrogations that began at 4 a.m. and again at 9:30 p.m. that
following day, and after two police-prepared statements were put in
front of this 14 year old kid and told this is what he did, Davontae was
instructed to adopt the police officer’s typewritten confessions that
sent him to prison for 37-90 years – a virtual life sentence for a kid
who was only 14 years old. Tragically, he did not realize what they had
just done to him in that interrogation room.
In the first statement prepared at 4 a.m. by police, Davontae’s role
in the killing was not clear at all. He does not even place himself at
the scene of the crime. They knew they had a problem getting a
conviction with that statement because it was seriously lacking any
evidence of admissions of guilt to anything.

Seventeen hours later, at 9:30 p.m., they picked him up again, and
prepared another statement in which they told Davontae he actually
helped commit the murders and had him sign a confession to it all.
Davontae, who suffered from a reading comprehension disability, never
read either statement. It was read to him in a leading manner and he was
told to agree to its accuracy.

The interrogations were done in violation of
Michigan law that required a parent or attorney present for a child
under the age of 16 to ensure the proceedings were done without
violating his right to remain silent or to seek the assistance of
counsel. But we know from having watched the video of the interrogation
and having read the two statements prepared by Detroit Police, Davontae
did not confess to anything. Information from the crime scene was fed to
him by the interrogating officer who then leadingly asked Davontae if
the statements were true. Davontae, willing to please his interrogator,
answered affirmatively. And this they call a confession?
4. ballistics evidence at the crime
scene seriously undermined the statements in which the officers induced
Davontae to say he used a Mini-14 to help kill the victims. It is
undisputed that Mini-14 casings were not found at the scene.
It is also undisputed that police never found the Mini-14 they say in
Davontae’s statement that he used. Nor for that matter did the
prosecution ever argue that Davontae threw the gun away.
He did not commit
those murders, and they know it!
5. there was the confession and testimony by another
defendant, a total stranger to Davontae, who confessed to the crimes
with greater detail and for whom all the forensics evidence corroborated
his version of the murders – well known freelance self-professed hit
man Vincent Smothers. The AK-47 weapon Smothers admitted to using
matched the ballistics evidence found at the Runyon Street killings and
at the scene of another murder he committed. In addition, Smothers
identified an accomplice in the Runyon Street killings who used a 45
pistol, which when found, also clearly matched some of the casings and
bullets at the crime scene. Again, the forensics evidence in this case
clearly corroborated Smothers’ rendition of events that day in which he
confessed to committing the murders.

It does not stop there, ladies and gentlemen. Here’s some more truth
medicine that the prosecutor and Detroit Police have kept from the
public. In his various statements admitting to the Runyon Street
killings, Smothers also provided evidence that a .40 caliber pistol
taken from that home was used in yet another contract killing he carried
out on an officer’s wife at a CVS store in Detroit. Davontae, in his
statement, never mentioned anything about a 40 caliber pistol. That
makes sense, don’t you think when Detroit Police at the time they
prepared his statement did not know about the 40 caliber pistol until
Smothers confessed to the crime a year later!
Smothers
in his confession described in detail the amount of drugs and money
taken from the Runyon Street killings, a fact conspicuously missing from
Davontae’s so-called confession.
6.Kym Worthy, prosecutor in this case, is now attempting to silence Smothers! She and
Judge Sullivan of the Court, who recently denied Davontae’s motion to
withdraw his ill-advised guilty plea to these murders based on
newly-discovered evidence of Smothers’ confession. Smothers,
after several legal maneuvers with the prosecutor’s office in
attempting to get immunity in exchange for testifying on the witness in
Davontae’s favor, recently indicated to the Associated Press that he is
now willing to take the stand without a grant of immunity, feeling
atoned for his crimes after learning that Davontae was wrongfully
convicted of them based on police and prosecutorial misconduct in
extracting a bogus confession from him and inducing him to plea to the
murders!

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Prison Reform Movement

I am Against the death penalty, believe that the United States Judicial System is flawed, yet fixable; Prison Reform and Sentencing Reform should be major agenda's for each state- we need to stop warehousing prisoners and ready those who are going to parole. I believe in Restorative Justice.
Inmate rehabilitation improves public safety and lowers prison costs.
“We have to care because we can't afford not to".
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Prison Reform Movement

The United States Criminal Justice System is flawed- broken beyond repair. Prisons should be abolished. Treatment and social safety nets could effectively replace what we have in place now. Until society can finally come to terms with no prisons and jails, we will continue to advocate for Prison and Criminal Justice reforms.

Posts here are NOT always my work. See disclaimer in the 'about' section. This blog serves as a Public Service Announcement.